


Away

by rabidchild67



Series: The Satchmo Cycle [6]
Category: White Collar
Genre: Dog(s), Fluff, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-11-25
Updated: 2012-11-25
Packaged: 2017-11-19 12:12:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,507
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/573141
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rabidchild67/pseuds/rabidchild67
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Neal dog-sits. Satchmo needs medicine. Hilarity ensues. We’ve all been there.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Away

Satchmo is sad and a little nervous. 

He’s sad because Honey and Sweetie are going Away, and to a dog, Away is forever and for always. Away is where you go and never see your Mama again, even if you get to sleep in a soft bed and play with The Ball all the day. Away is where nice old Mr. Pawlowski from next door went in an ambulance that one time and never came back.

Satchmo knows they are going Away because Sweetie took the suitcases down out of the crawl space on Wednesday and started making lists of things to pack. When she opens the big suitcase, Satch sits inside and doesn’t move. He thinks if he takes the suitcase that she’ll change her mind, but Honey is there and shoos Satchmo out of the bedroom for the whole evening. 

Satch harrumphs and sulks in the living room. 

“I don’t know what you’re so mad about,” Honey says to him later, drinking a beer and rubbing his ears. “Neal’s going to be here to take care of you. You like Neal.”

Satchmo’s tail thumps a little bit – he likes Mr. Neal a lot. Mr. Neal is happy and pleasant and takes Satchmo on adventures, like that time they went to the planetarium with The Mouse and Satch pretended to be a Seeing Eye dog. Mr. Neal brings him real chicken for treats. 

But even with the promise of fun times with Mr. Neal, Satch is still sad. He is so sad that maybe his belly is upset and it makes him fart.

“Whoa! Hey!” Honey says, waving a hand in the air. “Ya gotta poop, buddy?” They go for a walk, and Satch does have to poop, but it’s a little bit messy.

“Satch has diarrhea,” Honey reports as soon as they get home. 

This would normally not be an entirely bad thing, because it means there will be rice and ground chicken for dinner. But: “Guess it’s time for the pink stuff,” Sweetie says, and heads for the medicine cabinet.

Satchmo doesn’t like the pink stuff, it is yucky. And Sweetie has to shoot it down his throat with a big syringe which makes Satch go _shplek!_ and gag.

\----

“I really wish we didn’t have to saddle you with a sick dog,” Sweetie says to Mr. Neal the next morning.

Mr. Neal rubs Satchmo’s ears and says, “Don’t worry about it, Elizabeth. How hard can it be to give a dog medicine?”

“It’s not, really,” Sweetie says, and shows Mr. Neal how to do it, even if she just did it before breakfast. Satch makes grimacing faces and stretches his neck away from her, but she grabs his snout and shoves the syringe in easily past his teeth and shoots the medicine right down his throat. He has to let her. She is Sweetie. 

“Piece of cake,” Mr. Neal says with a frown on his face. 

Honey and Sweetie leave very soon after that, and before Satch has a chance to whimper, Mr. Neal asks, “Who wants to go for a jog in the park?”

Satchmo likes the park, so he wags and wags.

Mr. Neal and Satch spend the whole day at the park, running and playing and Mr. Neal even shares a pretzel with Satch for lunch and buys him his own bottle of water. When they get home, Satch is so tired he almost forgets that Honey and Sweetie are Away.

\----

The doorbell rings while Mr. Neal is making a big steak in the kitchen. Satchmo barks, but he doesn’t go to the door. The steak might fall on the floor, and he will be there if it does. 

“It’s open!” Neal calls, and The Mouse comes in with some biscuits from the bakery for Satchmo. Satchmo loves The Mouse, but there is steak, and he only gives his friend a sniff and marches on his feet next to Mr. Neal. He leaves the biscuit The Mouse gives him on the floor for later.

“You’re just in time,” Mr. Neal says. They have dinner and Mr. Neal gives Satchmo all the leftover steak with his rice and chicken. 

Later, when Mr. Neal and The Mouse are playing chess, Neal looks at the wall and says, “Almost forgot! It’s time for the dog’s medicine.”

Satchmo hears the word medicine and heads upstairs to Sweetie’s office on the third floor. He can still hear Mr. Neal talking to The Mouse, though. 

“Medicine?” The Mouse says.

“Yeah, Satchmo’s got a delicate constitution, apparently. El showed me how to give him this stuff.”

“What’s he do, hold his nose and dog it down?”

“Ha-ha. There’s a syringe, see? One tablespoon – there. OK, Satch…Satch? Where’d he go?”

“He’s headed for the hills,” The Mouse says with a laugh.

“He’s smarter than I thought.”

Satch can hear Mr. Neal coming up the stairs calling for him, and he knows he should come when someone calls to him, but it’s not Honey, so…

Mr. Neal looks for Satch on the second floor, in Honey and Sweetie’s room, and in the guest room and in all the closets.

“Satch?” Mr. Neal is on the third floor because Satch can hear the floor creak. “Satchmo buddy?” Satchmo wags and wags because it’s what he does when he is called, but he doesn’t go to Mr. Neal and he knows it’s naughty but he can’t help himself.

The light in the room comes on, and Satchmo is found out. “There you are! Hey, believe me, I know this stuff sucks, but ya gotta take it, buddy.”

Satch looks up at Mr. Neal, and The Mouse, who is behind him with a glass in his hand. 

“Come on, Satch,” Mr. Neal calls, but he doesn’t come. He feels bad about being bad and so he hangs his head down.

“Satchmo!” he says, his tone sharper, and Satch doesn’t want him to be angry, so he walks over slowly and sits down with his butt on Mr. Neal’s shoes. Mr. Neal sighs and moves around to face him, and crouches down. He takes Satch’s snout in his hand and tries to put the syringe through Satchmo’s front teeth. 

_That’s not the way Sweetie does it,_ Satch tries to say to Mr. Neal by moving his head to the side, but Mr. Neal tries again and again. 

“I think you have to open his mouth, maybe,” The Mouse suggests, so Mr. Neal squeezes Satchmo’s cheeks, pushing his fingertips under his lips, but _That’s not the way Sweetie does it,_ Satch says to Mr. Neal by standing up and backing away a few steps, and soon he is in the hallway because The Mouse has moved to the side.

Mr. Neal stops following Satch on his hands and knees and looks up at The Mouse, who is laughing again.“Maybe if you tackled him from behind,” he suggests.

Mr. Neal gets up and comes into the hallway and stands over Satchmo with a leg on either side of him, and bends over and takes his jaws into his hand from behind, and tries to pry them open, with the syringe pressing at the side of Satchmo’s lips. _That’s not the way Sweetie does it,_ Satch says to Mr. Neal by walking forward. But Mr. Neal is clever and he moves along with Satchmo and presses his legs together so that Satch has to stop walking. Mr. Neal crouches down, which forces Satchmo to sit.

_That’s not the way Sweetie does it,_ Satch tries to say to Mr. Neal by struggling underneath him and whining, but Mr. Neal is determined. He presses against Satch’s jaw, hard, and it is forced open. When he sticks the syringe in and pushes on it, it’s not pointed in the right place, so it all hits Satchmo’s tongue.

Satchmo coughs and gags, and soon there are lines of pink drool coming out of his mouth and they are getting all over Mr. Neal’s nice white shirt.

Mr. Neal lets him go, and Satch coughs the rest of the pink stuff out onto the rug. _That’s not the way Sweetie does it,_ he says to Mr. Neal, looking at him sideways.

“Aw, crap, now I have to give it to him again,” Mr. Neal says, and sits down on the floor. “Do you mind going to get the bottle? It’s in the kitchen cabinet above the sink.”

“Sure,” The Mouse says and leaves the room.

“You’re gonna be the death of me, buddy,” Mr. Neal says, and Satchmo pants. 

“Hey, did you know this stuff comes in pills?” The Mouse says when he returns, and holds up a box of medicine.

“What? You’ve got to be kidding me.”

“Yeah. I wrapped some in a bit of ham from the fridge. Hey, Satchmo!”

Satchmo looks at The Mouse.

“Catch!” He tosses a piece of ham at Satchmo, and he swallows it whole. 

_That’s the way **Honey** does it,_ Satchmo tells Mr. Neal and licks his chops.

\----

Thank you for your time.


End file.
